Sarah Churman responds to questions....

It was a matter of time until Sarah found the time to answer some questions pertaining to her ability to speak clearly and how she hears before and after getting her implantable hearing aid. It is really astounding to read comments from people saying how it's an impossibility for one to develop a clear voice with no deaf accent. Here's Sarah Churman's money shot on one of the  most asked question,"How do you know how to talk?":

Anyway, everyone is different. Everyone heals differently, everyone learns differently, and everyone excels at different things. I personally have always LOVED to read and write. English and Grammar have always been something I have enjoyed. I also enjoy talking! (Big shocker to those who know me huh? NOT! Lol.) I have worked very hard to overcome and to speak well. I went to deaf ed school when I was very young, then on to public school where I took speech classes and therapy. I don't think people realize how intently I read lips. When you read lips, you are studying how people move their mouths, where they place their tongue (and for those of you with tongue rings, yes, you trip me up) and their teeth. It's a skill I have had 29 years to hone.

Next question: "How did she know what the doc was saying without looking at her mouth?"

Um. I got my ear turned on :) How do YOU know what people are saying? You HEAR them. I don't mean to be rude, but really? I don't know, I can't explain the brain or how it works. I just know my ear works and I heard her clear as a bell. (which was awesome) I've always been able to hear some noise if it was loud enough with my hearing aids, just not able to make a distinction as to what people were actually saying. If you covered your mouth, I couldn't read your lips. The best way I know to explain it is like this.; if you went to a foreign country and someone spoke to you, you'd know they were talking because you can hear something, but you have no idea what they are actually saying. Hope that helps.

With hearing aids, noise distortion is always an issue which is why sometimes hearing people talk can get muddled. Sounds are electronically amplified but gets distorted. But with the Esteem implantable hearing aid this distortion gets eliminated because it uses the ear's "eardrum as a natural microphone, picking up sounds through the ear canal, thereby using the body’s natural anatomy to reduce the background noise, distortion, and acoustic feedback that people experience with conventional hearing aids."

It's pretty galling to see people dismiss the very notion that deaf people cannot have the ability to speak clearly. I don't think the motto "deaf/hh people can do anything except hear" precludes the ability to speak clearly. Some require more intense speech therapy and training while others not so much. It all depends on amount of hearing loss, types of frequency loss, early intervention, amount of speech therapy and probably the most important of all is the love to talk constantly and not be afraid to find ways to improve speech diction. Although I believe that we can have the ability to hear just not close to the level of a hearing person but that Esteem implantable hearing aid sure comes pretty close.

The Sarah Churman Saga Continues.....

Since I am unable to contribute on Deaf Echo (for their petty reasons that's seven months old) and respond to comments over there I will do so here on my blog regarding what Mishkazena said:

"i'm glad for sarah churman. i wish her the best of luck. however, the title 'hearing her voice for the first time' is misleading. many people deny this, insisting one can develop a clear voice with no deaf accent without hearing one's voice in the past. it's an impossibility. yet our experiences and knowledge are dismissed. we're ridiculed and painted an anti implant group by the adoring and awe-struck hearing audience. this had been reinforced by several deaf people with a chip on their shoulders against culturally deaf people taking this as yet another opportunity to attack these deaf people."

I think it all boils down to the missing context of that YouTube title which says, "29 years old and hearing myself for the 1st time!" which could have been meant to say "29 years old and hearing myself clearly and loudly for the first time."  We don't know who put that title in but it was Sarah's husband who videotaped her. It was her husband who put that video on YouTube which means it was probably most likely her husband who wrote down that title.  But what we don't know is that there could be some truth to that title that Sarah was hearing her own voice for the first time. Unless you have her audiogram and a complete picture of her history, I suggest people withhold judgement until it becomes clear on Sarah's hearing loss.

Having said that, people with high frequency hearing loss can and do have a harder time hearing one's own voice, especially if the person is a female such as in probably the case for Sarah Churman. I don't know. Instead of saying it's an impossibility that she could speak so clearly and say she's deaf consider the option of keeping an open mind. Sarah already explained to Ellen DeGeneres that she cannot explain completely why she can speak so well and gets asked with that question all the time. She told Ellen that she accredited her good speech to deaf ed, speech therapy and her love to talk alot. But somehow people seem to try and paint her as a liar and not telling the truth. 

Next we have Dianrez's blog who continues to misunderstand and even twist on what I've said in the past.

People who have even a slight amount of hearing at some point, or who were born with hearing, are able to make the most of it in many cases and these are the ones most helped by hearing aids or later cochlear implants or the new implantable middle-ear device. Those with excellent auditory memory do the best of all. That the media and some bloggers continue to categorize them as "deaf" is misleading: these people are not, NOT deaf.

There are so many different types of hearing LOSS. I used this word deliberately. They are people with auditory memory going way back, even unconsciously; they have brain pathways in the speech range that worked at one time, and may still work. Then they "suffered" a LOSS. The memory traces are still there, however.

Hard of hearing people have this, too. McConnell, himself hard-of-hearing, acknowledges that there are different types of hearing LOSS, but he makes the mistake of lumping profoundly deaf people into this group. These are people without any auditory memory from birth, and even with early cochlear implants, may not always develop useful hearing as Heuer points out in his article.

A few profoundly deaf people have cochlear implants and are said to be living as hearing people, such as the Chaikof sisters of Cochlearimplantonline.com. Many, as all of us personally know, do not hear as well and as many stash them in drawers as those that use them. (Heuer)

I discussed in my blogs on the key to early intervention in conjunction with using current hearing technology to make it work, even for those who are profoundly deaf using cochlear implant, and make use of the auditory cortex during those crucial 4 years window of opportunity. I made my point about early intervention numerous times in my blogs, especially on cochlear implants, such as here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and many more going back a few years in my blog. The phrase "hard of hearing" does not pertain to db loss nowadays simply because of the advent of cochlear implant technology.  It's the ability to discriminate words, understand environmental sounds and speak intelligibly with the help of current hearing technology along with audio and speech therapies. Cochlear implants make it possible nowadays for those born profoundly deaf get implanted at such a young age and develop the ability to discriminate the spoken words (without looking) and be able to speak extremely well. The key has always been early intervention (rather than "auditory memory") using the existing hearing technology with lots of supports and encouragements. Not every instances are a success for various reasons but successes there are. In fact, Dianrez's own suggestion at the end of her blog supports my argument about profoundly deaf people can be put into the category of "hard of hearing":

Deaf: having little usable hearing for speech. Having little usable hearing for environmental sounds. Having little usable hearing even with devices.

You have profoundly deaf people who were born profoundly deaf whose hearing (what's left of it) is considered still usable only because of the existence of cochlear implant makes it possible to bridge that gap. Young deaf children have usable hearing for listening and speech development if cochlear implant is considered. It still usable hearing when it comes to environmental sounds. In a word, that would fit the definition of hard of hearing for prelingually (profoundly) deaf people who end up benefitting greatly from cochlear implants. Not all would fit into the category as hard of hearing people but many do. Even Jamie Berke of About.com Deafness admitted how the cochlear implant technology changed the meaning of the term "hard of hearing" for profoundly deaf people.

What is the difference between being hard of hearing and being deaf? The answer is not simple, and is getting even harder to define with the growth of cochlear implants.

You have cochlear implant wearers who consider themselves as deaf and hard of hearing just like you have hearing aid users who consider themselves as deaf and hard of hearing, just like me. Turn the device off, you're deaf. Turn it on, you're hard of hearing. Just like Sage in this captioned video below when she was 16 years old who was outfitted with a cochlear implant at age 22 months speaks about her cochlear implant.



There's no doubt that Sage is hard of hearing but then again she's deaf, too.

As for the Chaikof sisters (Rachel Chaikof that runs her own website Cochlear Implant Online) they never made the claims of living as "hearing people" but rather they have the ability to interact and associate with hearing people solely because of the early intervention with cochlear implant and speech therapies made it possible today to interact. Just as I can interact easily with hearing people but I'm certainly not a hearing person. They know they are deaf but see themselves as hard of hearing. Let's not twist words, Dianrez.

Another twist by Dianrez about what I said.

Then we have people who defend the people who are involved in the quest to hear again. Mike McConnell is one. Immediately he jumps on people who point out the flaws in such cures by way of electronic and mechanical devices: "Why is it so hard to congratulate a grown deaf adult seeing the immediate (and emotional) success from her implantable hearing aid in a video?" He has written several consecutive blogs, each insisting that Sarah is deaf four different ways and is still deaf when she turns off the implant. He adds, "Those people need to take their brains out of the gutter and stop with the stereotyping of what deaf people can or cannot do, especially on the ability to speak well. This is especially true coming from deaf people themselves which serves only an ironic and hypocritical reminder. Yet people continue with this conspiracy theory thinking something's afoot. Practically insinuating that she is not deaf because there is no way she can speak that well. No way!! Well, get over it folks, she is deaf."

I've not described nor insisted that Sarah is deaf in four different ways. Please stop with the disingenuous hyperbole and dishonesty, Dianez. I've already explained in the above about the terms "deaf" and "hard of hearing." Secondly, my comment asking why is it so hard to congratulate Sarah Churman's implantable hearing aid success was taken out of a paragraph I wrote while leaving the rest behind that explains my questioning which had nothing to do with about jumping on "people who point out flaws in such cures" (because implantable hearing aids are not a cure). Rather my comment had to do with people lamenting about one's own history struggling with his/her hearing aid wishing his/her story was video-taped and had gone viral, too. Instead of being happy for her you hear lamentations, the whole nine-yards "woe-is-me."

Echoing Sentiments

Chris Heuer produced a piece in Deaf Echo basically lamenting over Sarah Churman's YouTube video that went viral by going over his own little history and hinting that he may just take back his sincerity about Sarah Churman.

Sarah Churman, if you’re reading this, let me start out with a disclaimer. What I’m about to write isn’t about you. If your implanted hearing aid works for you, that’s great. For the moment I say this with all sincerity.

Some of you, including Sarah Churman, might be wondering what I mean by that remark: “…for the moment.” By way of an explanation, let me tell you a story.

The one thing that many, many people continue to forget about the viral YouTube video of Sarah Churman was that the Churmans never expected it to go viral in the first place. In the first 8 days since YouTube aired, she has been on the Today Show with Matt Lauer and the Ellen DeGeneres show, and was featured on CNN with Anderson Cooper. Webwise, she was all over the place as well. Pretty good in just a few days time. Technically it'd been about 5 or 6 days time rather than 8 days because it took a few days before the video went viral and that's when the media caught wind of it, both the web and on TV. It went viral with no fault of Sarah's own. She didn't put the video up, her husband did with the encouragement of his mother so that their families and friends would be able to witness Sarah's reaction to her implant being turned on. The video captured accurately that Sarah was hearing herself for the first time. And now some people are heaping scorn at her for a variety of reasons. 

Strange world indeed.

Why is it so hard to congratulate a grown deaf adult seeing the immediate (and emotional) success from her implantable hearing aid in a video? A result that took Sarah by surprise at the clarity of sound that was coming in. Why reserve such congratulations to her and instead lament about one's own history struggling with his hearing aid wishing his story was video-taped and had gone viral, too? Had Sarah Churman's video received only 2000 views, all of this would've been essentially a "non-story." But instead it churned out some 7.2 million views/hits so far in less than two weeks.

Of course, I don't expect that everybody will share the same sentiments echoing mine when it comes to congratulating Sarah on her successful use of her implantable hearing aid. My approach is to separate myself from Sarah's and leave it at that because I recognize that each of us is different when it comes to our hearing loss, our experience, our upbringing, our preferences to communicate, and whether we successfully used our hearing aids, cochlear implants, other implantable hearing devices (e.g. Baha, Envoy, etc) or none at all (e.g. signing) to our benefits.


Off topic:
I'm disappointed and sad to report this but I am left with no recourse but to report this behavior and continued misunderstanding.

I left a comment at Deaf Echo on a blog piece about Sarah Churman just a few minutes ago. I went back to see if any responses came up (Patti's came up) only to see that my comment was once again removed. I am guessing this has to do with a disagreement and misunderstanding over what I wrote, my opinion several months back (and here) in Febuary 2011.  But I wasn't sure if I was still on the banned list (seven months later) and made a screen copy of my comment submission just in case. Sure enough, I'm persona non grata (the new commenting rules can be seen here while the old seen on Feb 2, 2011 can be seen here) for petty reasons, I suppose.

Before at 9:50 AM PCT (Oct 9, 2011):

Removed at approximately 10:10 AM PCT (Oct 9, 2011):

As you can see my comment was deleted. Nothing demeaning, hateful, derogatory, or abusive about it as you can clearly see from what I wrote seen in the screen capture. No ad-hominem attacks.  No foul language. And certainly not a spam. I think whoever removed my comment needs to have the cojones to look past his/her own petty feelings when it comes to a difference of opinions instead of hiding behind claims of "abusive comments" as reason for the continued blocking. Incredibly, the moderator(s) still refuse to point out exactly which or what comment of mine back in February 2011 was considered as an "abusive comment" which can, frankly, be anything they would want it to be and call it justified.  All of my comments have not been abusive nor disrespectful as Candy pointed out before as a witness to this whole charade. Clearly my recent comment seen in the screen capture above is not abusive nor disrespectful at all.  Folks, let's learn to let go such pettiness since after all Bobby (one of the moderator of Deaf Echo) said:

We love a good discussion that drives things forward, and we act aggressively to maintain a good environment for our readers and writers.

I've always loved having a good discussion that drives things forward in my blog and in other discussion forums, too. Nothing in my responses were shown to breach that "good environment for our readers and writers" as you can see in my latest comment that was conveniently deleted.  But then again, it's their blog and they have every right to do what they feel is right even if it means letting misunderstanding getting the better of them. Yet, I find all this incredulously humorous. And I certainly have a right to blog my opinions on people who simply cannot accept alternative viewpoints and opinions who are unable to simply agree to disagree. Agreeing to disagree is a show of professionalism. Pettiness is not.

Captioned Video: The Doubters of Sarah Churman

Remember the phrase people, deaf people can do anything...even speak really, really well just like Sarah Churman. Even hear pretty good, too! But we still have a hearing loss at the end of the day when we turn off our hearing aids or cochlear implant.

Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Churman

I predicted this would happen a few days ago that Rush Limbaugh would discuss about the YouTube viral sensation of Sarah Churman and the Esteem implantable hearing aid remarkable result and impact on her and to the rest of the viewers. I heard Rush discussed the whole thing over my radio this morning. And his transcript can now be seen on his website.

The video of it on YouTube has gone viral. Millions of people are watching it. They got one thing wrong. She was not deaf. For the Esteem to work, you have to have some hearing. If you're a hundred percent deaf it won't work because it restores your natural hearing using your own eardrum. It's a prosthetic hearing implant, just became available last year, totally invisible. If you were to meet her today you would not see it. The Esteem works with her natural hearing to restore it to near optimum levels. The video I mentioned, you can actually see Sarah, the minute the Esteem is turned on she can hear herself laugh for the first time. She can hear her own voice clearly for the first time. She's so overwhelmed by all of this, something that we all take for granted, that she starts to cry.


Now, the video's only a minute and a half long, but it's a couple-Kleenex video. She's crying and laughing so hard, she goes through several tissues. Her husband, Sloan Churman, videotaped the moment for her, and he posts it for family and friends to see that could not be with her in the doctor's office when they turned the thing on. So one person tells another, the video starts to go viral and a week later six and a half million people have seen it or there have been six and a half million views of the video and what made it all possible was the Esteem from Envoy Medical. Now, you can see the video on YouTube, and we're gonna post it at RushLimbaugh.com, too. You can see the Esteem at EnvoyMedical.com, or call them, 800-518-7320.


But you should see this video. The moment it's turned on for the first time in her life she can hear, and it's an amazing thing. If you've never lost your hearing you have no clue what it's like and it's just an amazing thing to see, and it's a fabulous product, and when I saw the video, I said, "That's it! That's the Esteem, that's our client, that's our sponsor." I was proud as I could be, as we only associate with the best.

One thing Rush got wrong was that, yes, Sarah was born deaf. Maybe Rush was thinking in the context as stone deaf but yes, she's deaf and even hard of hearing, too. And now, she's easily hard of hearing to the point when people would automatically assume her to be hearing the way she would speak so clearly.

Congratulations, Sarah!

The Sarah Churman Effect

It was amazing to watch a YouTube video of Sarah Churman having her implantable hearing aid called the Esteem turned on for the first time and see her reaction to the clarity of sound around her. Her husband, Sloan, video taped the whole thing and was reluctant to put it on YouTube since it was supposed to be a private moment like getting married or having a baby as Sloan said.

There are one of three things I'm seeing in YouTube comments and elsewhere from people who objected to the whole video taping thing:

1) It's fake. The whole thing was acted out in order to help promote the Esteem implantable hearing aid.
2) The title of the YouTube video was "misleading" and that she didn't really hear her voice for the first time.
3) Her voice sounded too "hearing-like" and could be heard clearly raising questions if her hearing loss is really severe.

First off, check out Sarah Churman's first blog soon after her Esteem was activated describing her awareness about the new sound around here.

Anyway, I'm supposed to hold the remote up to the device implanted in my skull to activate it and I kept moving it which delayed it being turned on. Just about fainted, then 'viola!' it was on. For you mothers out there.......it was like that moment where time stands still as your baby slips into this world.......I just started crying, then crying more because I could hear myself crying. Then laughing, then freaking out over my laugh. That lead to the shakes and partial hyperventillating. Sloan's boisterous laugh and the grins from the docs was the icing on the cake. Then the tapping of the keys as the nurse lady did something on the computer, followed by the remote being set down on the counter.......I could HEAR it!!! Felt like quite the idiot as I left the center (OMG, Sloan just sneezed in the shower, too funny!) grinning ear to ear.........worse case of 'perma-grin' I've ever had! Stepped outside while Sloan was telling me I was whispering, and walked to the car taking it all in. Foot steps, car doors, engine starting, already tired of hearing myself swallow. Lol. I kept asking "Is this normal? Do you hear that? Does that always do that? Is there a cup rattling around in the back of the car? (WHOA). Made my first phone calls. Called Lari and immediately heard the girls in the background. *Let me take this time to apologize to anyone I've ever called while the girls were chattering..............how the heck do you 'normal folks' hear anything with them in the background?!? Lol. She had Oli tell me "I love you Mommy", then Elise said "I ove you".......I started bawling and had to hand the phone off to Sloan. THAT was an awesome moment. Called my Mom and she was like "Are you talking to me now with the new ear?!?" Called my Dad and if I'm not mistaken I think I heard him get a little choked up. Got to Outback to eat with Alexis and was blindsided by the road noise upon stepping out of the car. The place was on a service road and WOW the highway is NOISY! Hurried up and got inside to get relief from the noise. Could actually hear the servers speaking instead of doing my usual routine of smiling politely and praying to God that they haven't said something I've ignored or not answered. When the waitress brought our drinks on the table I asked Sloan "Do you think she'd find it funny if I asked her to stop slamming the cups and plates on the table?" (I of course knew she wasn't actually slamming anything, I just found it amusing) Real shocker was when she brought my salad and I started to eat. WOW was that loud..........eating a crouton is like fireworks going off. I was certain people 5 tables over were thinking 'you hear that cow chewing?' Sloan and Alexis assured me that no one could hear me chew. Sloan got much satisfaction out of the fact that I promptly started eating with my mouth closed. I've been an avid 'smacker' my whole life.........

Her blog description of sound around her and her reaction on YouTube video doesn't strike me as a fake video or that Sarah is faking it. What's interesting is that those noise she's hearing are in the higher frequency range.

Secondly, about people who objected to the title of Sarah's YouTube video need to chill since her hearing loss precluded her from hearing anything of clarity and loudness, especially her own voice, despite wearing a regular hearing aid. We don't even know exactly the kind of frequency loss she has (one guy is asking for the whole nine yard requesting more hearing loss details from her). She could have a higher frequency hearing loss which may prevent her from hearing her own voice and would hear better at a lower frequency such as a male's voice, hence her picking up a Texan accent. I don't know but this is not really a case worth arguing over the title of her YouTube video. Some people are just plain picky and overly demanding.

Thirdly, her voice sounded too much like a "hearing person"? So what? She obtained her hearing aid at age two enabling her an early start on acquiring sound around her. Her speech training must've gone extremely well and with family support. Until more details come forth I'm not overly concerned on how well she speaks. What's surprising is to hear from people who are basically saying that it's impossible for a deaf person to speak to clearly and well that one wouldn't tell if the person is deaf. Those people need to take their brains out of the gutter and stop with the stereotyping of what deaf people can or cannot do, especially on the ability to speak well. This is especially true coming from deaf people themselves which serves only an ironic and hypocritical reminder.  Yet people continue with this conspiracy theory thinking something's afoot. Practically insinuating that she is not deaf because there is no way she can speak that well. No way!! Well, get over it folks, she is deaf. She speaks very well. And she has a slight Texan accent. And she wears a $30,000 implantable hearing aid. Her life has improved dramatically with the Envoy Esteem implantable hearing aid allowing her to her the sound around her with increased clarity for the first time in her 29 years of her life.


Congratulations, Sarah!